Neil Young wrote his song Old Man for a guy just like Garrett, an old Ranch Hand that fixed and mended everything needed on a ranch. Almost 70 years old, he is too old to find work on a ranch, so he found a job at a hotel in downtown Santa Fe where they treat him well he said.
I loved that song in my youth in the seventies, when I had no idea how it originated and was barely able to comprehend the English words, but the feeling ...
● We believe that Women’s Rights are Human Rights and Human Rights are Women’s Rights.
● We believe Gender Justice is Racial Justice is Economic Justice.
● Women have the right to live full and healthy lives, free of all forms of violence against our bodies.
● We believe in accountability and justice for police brutality and ending racial profiling and targeting of communities of color and Indigenous peoples.
● We believe it is our moral imperative to dismantle the gender and racial inequities within the criminal justice system.
● We believe in Reproductive Freedom.
● We believe in Gender Justice.
● We firmly declare that LGBTQIA Rights are Human Rights and that it is our obligation to uplift, expand and protect the rights of our gay, lesbian, bi, queer, trans, two-spirit or gender non-conforming brothers, sisters and siblings.
● We believe in an economy powered by transparency, accountability, security and equity.
● We believe in equal pay for equal work and the right of all women to be paid equitably.
● We recognize that women of color and Indigenous women carry the heaviest burden in the global and domestic economic landscape, particularly in the care economy.
● We believe that all workers – including domestic and farm workers - must have the right to organize and fight for a living minimum wage, and that unions and other labor associations are critical to a healthy and thriving economy for all.
● We believe Civil Rights are our birthright.
● We support Indigenous women’s right to access, own, develop and control land and its resources.
● We believe that all women’s issues are issues faced by women with disabilities and Deaf women.
● We believe it is time for an all-inclusive Equal Rights Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
● Rooted in the promise of America’s call for huddled masses yearning to breathe free, we believe in immigrant and refugee rights regardless of status or country of origin.
● We believe that every person, every community and Indigenous peoples in our nation have the right to clean water, clean air, and access to and enjoyment of public lands.
● We recognize that to achieve any of the goals outlined within this statement, we must work together to end war and live in peace with our sisters and brothers around the world. Ending war means a cessation to the direct and indirect aggression caused by the war economy and the concentration of power in the hands of a wealthy elite who use political, social, and economic systems to safeguard and expand their power.
Find the complete version here.
Use this outline to contact your representatives, be it by postcard as suggested, by e-mail and/or by making phone calls.
Use this bare bone outline to contemplate and formulate YOUR issues.
These women are from different states and had never met before but they practiced this song online.
Founder of Sweet Honey in the Rock a cappella ensemble
Refrain:
We who believe in freedom cannot rest
We who believe in freedom cannot rest until it comes
Verses:
Until the killing of Black men, Black mothers’ sons
Is as important as the killing of White men, White mothers’ sons
And that which touches me most is that I had a chance to work with people Passing on to others that which was passed on to me
To me young people come first, they have the courage where we fail
And if I can shed some light as they carry us through the gale
The older I get the better I know that the secret of my going on
Is when the reins are in the hand of the young who dare to run against the storm
Not needing to clutch for power, not needing the light just to shine on me
I need to be just one in the number as we stand against tyranny
Struggling myself don’t mean a whole lot I come to realize
That teaching others to stand up and fight is the only way my struggle survive
I’m a woman who speaks in a voice and I must be heard At time I can be quite difficult, I’ll bow to no man’s word
Posted in light of on-going police brutality against black folks, the latest victim we heard of sadly being a beautiful young woman, Sandra Bland.
"This video of the arrest of Sandra Bland shows totally outrageous police behavior. No one should be yanked from her car, thrown to the ground, assaulted and arrested for a minor traffic stop. The result is that three days later she is dead in her jail cell. This video highlights once again why we need real police reform. People should not die for a minor traffic infraction. This type of police abuse has become an all-too-common occurrence for people of color and it must stop." ~ Bernie Sanders - from the Bernie Sanders For President facebook page.
"Part of the point is that the lived experience of black women is excluded from the public discourse. It’s never going to be their turn to have their voices heard, so they have to create the opportunities to make their voices heard. Protests are always criticized as being at the wrong time because those who need to protest are never the people writing the agenda. That’s the value of protest." - Tim DeChristopher interviewed by Bill Moyers
There is such greatness in American culture along side the sordid, shameful aspects. It is important to embrace all aspects of reality, to never close our eyes to one or the other, not to what is good and not to what is bad. Wear rose colored glasses if you must, but never ever forget when you wear them.
There is no justice for one that got killed, nothing can restore the dead one, not in our life on this earth.
For the killer of Trayvon Martin to walk away a free man only confirms an asinine Wild West attitude shared by enough US citizens to worm it's way in to law. Zimmerman's not guilty verdict makes me ashamed once again to have become an American, of my own free will I might ad.
Americans overreact to violence and really need to educate themselves on non-violent conflict resolution with attempts at more sophisticated psychological understanding, appropriate for our times.
Trayvon Martin Was a honor student with a 3.7 GPA. Was accepted into college on a full-ride. Was a volunteer of over 600 service hours.
"A sky full of stars, blue sea as far as you can see
An earth where flowers grow, can you wish for more?
Together shall we live, every sister, brother
Young children of the rainbow, a fertile land."
"They gathered by the tens of thousands in the drenching rain to face down terrorism with song. They rallied against far-right fanatic Anders Behring Breivik, now on trial for a bomb-and-shooting rampage that killed 77 people. They sang a Norwegian version of a Pete Seeger tune that the
confessed mass killer claims has been used to brainwash the country's
youth into supporting immigration. Defiant singalongs of "Children of the Rainbow" were staged in Oslo
and other major Norwegian cities, even as the ninth day of the trial
went on with survivors of Breivik's attacks giving tearful testimony. In downtown Oslo alone, about 40,000 people raised their voices as
Norwegian artist Lillebjoern Nilsen played the song, a Norwegian version
of Seeger's "My Rainbow Race."
